Name Me
by FullMentalPanic
Summary: A FFVII AU that merges with a classic fairy tale in far from the classic style.
1. The Beginning

**Name Me**

_The Beginning_

By FullMentalPanic

Aerith leaned against one cool wall and tried to think of the bright side. This wasn't too different. There was metal overhead, just like how the plate covered the slums. The air actually smelled cleaner, even if the thick taste of pollutants had been replaced with the slightly metallic one of piped AC. The view wasn't much, was non-existent in fact, but what she could see was tidy and clean. Painfully clean almost. Disinfectant tingled in her nose and she wondered if it was standard procedure for the cells to be this thoroughly sanitized or if there was a particular reason why this one reeked of chemicals.

Windows would have been nice.

So would less glaring lighting.

The lights suddenly died and she took a slow breath. Light wasn't gone altogether, it had just been so radically dimmed it seemed like darkness to photo adjusted eyes. It was a deliberately unsubtle reminder that Shinra expected all its prisoners to get a full eight hours of sleep.

Prisoner.

_Again._

_Not for long, _she thought, then laughed at her bravado. What she'd feared had finally happened. The nightmarish shadows of her past that had stalked her existence for years had finally caught her again. Even during those precious years of freedom she'd seen the power of that lurking darkness that wanted to swallow her. In the slums, furthest from the reach of Shinra, she had still seen increasing numbers of its agents and influence and known that they were only tendrils of a massive plant. Now she was in the bowels of that unliving creature.

She sighed, she was getting disturbingly dramatic in her captivity. That didn't bode well as she'd only been in this room for a few hours, no matter how much her emotions insisted it had been longer.

Feeling her way over to the hard cot she sank down, sincerely wishing there was a blanket that came with it. It would have been nice to have something she could detach from Shinra and use as hers and as a barrier against her surroundings. She hadn't been here long, the fact that she was sitting unmolested in her cell now didn't mean anything. It had only begun.

Aerith stiffened, everything focused on her ears. There it was again, a soft tapping, almost like a...knock? Who in Shinra would knock? Regardless, she sprang from the slab of an excuse for a bed and pressed the side of her head to the door. Nothing, not a whisper of noise. She pulled back and again heard the soft sound. She tried the wall of the cell next to her. While she could hear some echoes and movement through there, none of them were the one that had first seized her attention.

She pulled back in confusion and uneasy speculation about the mindset that had dictated an insulated hallway but allowed for sound to carry between the individual cells. The rapping came again, slightly louder, and she was able to narrow its location; behind her. She turned slowly. Behind her and...up? Carefully moving her gaze towards the ceiling above the cot she clearly made out a set of tiny eyes faintly glowing in the dim light.

Rat!

In half a breath she'd yanked off one soft boot and sent it hurtling towards the blue eyed little beast. The two pinpoints of soft light disappeared, but then reappeared looking disturbingly unharmed and she heard her boot bounce off of the bed.

"Sorry."

It was low but distinct. She gaped. Rats didn't talk.

Jumping on the cot to get closer to whatever was on or in the wall might not have been an ideal example of prudence, but it was what she did. Habit reared its mighty head and she kicked off her other boot so her mom wouldn't get upset with her for stepping on the furniture with shoes. Conscience clear she stretched up on her toes against the wall and peered in the direction of the voice.

"I thought if I knocked first I wouldn't freak you out. So much for that, huh?"

She felt her heartbeat in her fingertips. That most definitely was not the voice of an animal. It was warm and humorous while still sounding sincerely apologetic.

"Don't worry," she surprised herself by answering. "I'm very...gutsy."

Relieved laughter rolled toward her and her pulse picked up further. What was this...thing? The small eyes came closer, looking almost human.

"So," the voice said in good-natured courtesy, "can I come in?"

"Can you?" she asked honestly. A little nervously she moved her hand above her head and closer to the eyes where her fingers tapped against some kind of grate.

"Sure," came the easy reply. "Just move back a bit so the grate doesn't hit you."

Aerith steadied herself with one hand against the wall at the head of the cot and stepped back. Immediately there was a dull clang and a creaky swing.

She heard a light "ha!" and something hurtled out of the vent. Hurriedly she pressed herself against the wall her hand rested on. A light impact against the far end of the cot settled on her ears.

"Whoa, this thing is even worse than the mattress I got as a cadet."

Her eyes were adjusting a bit more to the darkness, but she still couldn't place the location of the voice until the eyes turned to face her again.

A cadet? "Are you with Shinra?"

"Officially," the voice said cheekily.

That was good? She took a step forward on the unnaturally stiff cot and crouched down trying to make out the diminutive figure. If it was the official part of the company that had kidnapped her...but the Turks were usually officially 'unofficial' -

"Zack Fair," he, Zack was a boy's name, said. "First Class SOLDIER."

First Class sounded _awfully _official, and even she knew what SOLDIER was. She stiffened and leaned back until her crouch wobbled.

"Uh, reciprocal introduction?"

He had said official like it was a nominal identification. Shinra definitely had factions and groups that operated under the radar, was he one of those? Did that make them good, or even worse than the majority of the company? As long as he was against the part of Shinra that kidnapped her that should put him on her side. Since he was sneaking into her cell, that was the most likely case.

"Aerith," and since it was probably on public record now anyway, "Gainsborough."

"That really works."

She gave him an odd look that he probably couldn't see in the dark.

"Names are important, yours fits you. So how'd you get yourself thrown in one of the cells on the research floor?"

"Are you going to help me?"

"Ah...I'd like to, but it's kind of hard if I'm in the dark about what's going on," his laugh permeated the dry gloom, "so to speak."

"I'm in a cell. What else is there to tell?" Her name was one thing, but just handing over the secret that had gotten her captured and hunted and captured again was something else entirely.

"The 'why' would be be helpful," said his voice gently.

"Why?"

There was something like a sigh. "So we know that we can trust you. Shinra has a lot of enemies, and some of those enemies are just as bad if not worse than the company. They just don't have the same power so you don't hear about them. We just want to know you're not one of them."

"We?"

"...That would be part of you trusting us.

"..."

"Based on my incredible First Class honor, of course."

"..."

"You can trust me."

"Can I?" It seemed like everything she said was a question, but they were questions that needed to be asked, because she _didn't _know who she could trust. He'd just said that just because someone was against Shinra it didn't make them good themselves. Her whole body was tense with indecision and apprehension, and she was starting to quiver with fatigue. She settled, cross-legged, onto the cot.

Despite all her efforts she'd been captured. They knew where she lived, where her mom lived, where she spent her time, and likely that she didn't have a lot of resources to work with. Even if she got out of the Shinra building, what then? _That_ was still contingent on the very slim chance that she could get out of her cell and past scores of floors of security.

She didn't want to say she needed help. She couldn't make her escape depend on that. She couldn't because she still didn't know if there was anyone she could trust, and the reality might be that she had only herself to rely on.

She desperately hoped that wasn't the case.

_Show me I can trust you. Do something that shows that you're good._

The blue came slightly closer then sank closer to the mattress, and she had the impression he was mimicking her cross-legged posture.

"You can," he said with absolute and unshakeable confidence. "I _want_ to help you. Please. Let me."

What was the worst that could happen if she trusted him? That he wouldn't be reliable and this was all a ploy to gain her cooperation for a venture that could end in the death of the entire world.

...

What was the best that could happen?

There would be someone she could depend on, who would understand what she actually dealt with and help with the things she didn't fully comprehend herself. That would be very...good.

"My name is Aerith."

"Yep, and I'm Zack," he said playfully.

"My last name wasn't always Gainsborough."

"No?"

Her thoughts shifted back to her mother, the one who had green eyes like her own. Her heart raced faster than it had ever run before. "I'm an Ancient."

He didn't seem shocked, albeit she couldn't see his face to read his reaction.

"Thank you, Aerith." He didn't sound shocked at all either, more like he was relieved. "So Shinra just wanted to make sure they had ready access to the last Ancient?"

The thudding in her chest abruptly slowed down. This was not the reaction she'd been anticipating, and it left her with no preplanned response she could fall back on. "They want the Promised Land."

"What's that?"

"They think it's a place with an endless supply of mako."

"Is that what it is?"

"I don't know."

"_Could _it be?"

She was unfamiliar with her heritage, and if there was some well known Ancient maxim about what the Promised Land truly was, it had passed her by. She didn't think it was what Shinra supposed, but she didn't _know,_ which meant there was a possibility they were right. "Maybe."

"Hmm," the blue eyes shifted, like he was leaning back. "Do you know what kind of time frame we're working with?"

"What?"

"I mean - do you know when, or how, they're going to try to get this information out of you?"

"I'm not sure. I feel like they're leaving me alone on purpose right now, like they want to make sure I'm well rested."

"It's not -" he hesitated, and then said very gently, "it's not something they're just going to ask about, is it?"

"No."

She brought her legs up and gripped them against her chest. It was unclear yet persistent, flashes of what had been done to her -

A slight thump caused her to look away from her knees. The eyes were closer still, it was almost like the light from them was physically touching her.

"I can save you."

His eyes looked about a hand span above the cot, and her hands were below average in size. He sounded so assured though, it was a little comforting. Still, there was a heavy amount of doubt in her voice when she said, "Really?"

"It's what heroes do."

"Are you a hero?"

"I try." Her eyes had adjusted enough to see a movement like a shrug. It was odd to see it on someone so small. "It's not really something you can judge by your own standard. I need to act in ways that actually are good, not ways that just make me feel all glory bound. So," shining blue tipped sideways and slitted while teasing wound in his voice, "you'll let me know if I actually make it, right?"

"I won't lie." She did feel better talking to him, but she wouldn't rank his part in that as heroic. It wasn't clear if he could actually help her yet or not, and she didn't want to give him the impression there wasn't anything else he had to do.

"That's what I'm counting on. I need to get things set up. You've been a gracious hostess, I'll now be taking my leave."

"You're going?"

"I'll come back."

"When?" Don't go. He made the fact that she'd been imprisoned more real, but he also offered a way out. A way out where she wasn't alone.

"Soon." It seemed like he was edging toward the wall.

"When is soon?" She leaned forward and tried to grip a handful of her maliciously hard mattress, but it stubbornly refused to stay in her fingers.

"Possibly later tonight."

"That soon?" Her back straightened in surprise. Could it be over that quickly? What would happen when this part was 'over'?

"It's not completely up to me."

"Something the 'we' decides?"

"Yeah, but I'll use all my considerable charm to try to move things along quickly."

"Why did you come!" Why did he suddenly drop into her cell and offer hope? Was he trustworthy? Was it all just some ridiculous test that maddest of all insane scientists had concocted? How did she know she wouldn't be struck as soon as she trusted?

"Well, to see if you were worth saving."

"And am I?" she said in dry self-deprecation.

"Yes."

"How can you say that after such a short _acquaintance_?"

"I'm a very good judge of character."

"Which explains why you're working for a company like Shinra."

"Only officially. Are you seriously trying to convince me not to help you?"

"No." She was angry at how much she felt like crying. What was she supposed to do?

"Know what would help me out?" He stepped to her side, his eyes looking almost straight up.

"What?"

"I'm amazingly athletic, and I could probably figure this out if I had to, but it's not going to be easy to get back up to the grate. It's like five to seven stories up, from my limited perspective, and I'm an optimist so it's likely even higher than that."

"So..."

"Give me a boost?"

"Oh, uh, sure."

Her mind hadn't quite figured out how she was going to do that when the eyes moved to where one of her hands was still ineffectively grasping her cot. She took the hint and flipped her hand palm up. There were two points of sensation as he stepped onto her skin, and her fingers reflexively curled toward the pressure. They stopped when her ring finger met with resistance. It took a moment to place the sensation until it registered. It was a hand, a hand in a glove. Splayed out and digits spread it still easily fit on the tip of her finger.

He was so tiny. She didn't know if he was actively pushing against her or just leaning, but the pressure was almost ticklingly light. She was stronger than him.

"Don't bring me up too fast," he cautioned cheerily.

With a nod she slowly began to stand up. The pressure on her finger firmed a very little and she wondered distantly if this equated to holding hands. She wasn't quite tall enough to rest her hand inside the vent while keeping her palm flat, but she could get it just shy of the opening. There was an almost digging feeling in her hand and then he sprang away. Gone. Her hand closed on emptiness.

"Thanks," was said easily. "You should go ahead and try to sleep until I get back."

Right, that was going happen.

"Would you mind pulling the grate back down?"

She hesitantly reached up, but paused as the tips of her fingers hooked over the metal. It was like she would be separating them. It absurdly crossed her mind that she would be cutting off any reason for him to return if she closed the vent. It wasn't like she knew he had a valid reason to return anyway. What if he didn't?

"You'll come back?"

"I'll come back," he reiterated reassuringly.

She tried to pull it down slowly, but that only lasted two-thirds of the journey. Then a spring or something kicked in and the grate jerked away from her hand and slammed back into place against the wall.

"Don't worry, get some rest. If that's possible on that mattress. I'll be back."

The voice was already becoming more distant. Soon he would be gone, and she wouldn't have any way to bring him back. She had only his claim that he would return. She frantically searched for a way to tie them together and further convince him to come back. What was his name again?

"Promise, Zack?"

She'd waited too long, she wasn't fast enough. He'd already left, he didn't hear -

"Yeah, Aerith. I promise."

* * *

><p>AN: This came about when I was reading a fairytale to a younger sibling and thought how fun it would be to critique it through crossover. Having a lot of ideas for a FFVII crossover and a FMA crossover, I decided to do both. I'm posting both stories at the same time with the casual intent of seeing if the FFVII one or the FMA one is more popular. Feel free to read both. Each story will be three chapters long; beginning, middle, and end.


	2. The Middle

**Name Me**

_The Middle_

By FullMentalPanic

Sephiroth stalked in the area before his desk, stamping on the wish that their current undertaking was more combat oriented and less...social in nature. He was good at fighting, excelled at it. He even enjoyed it, when he could engage in a spar or show off with some of the very few friends he had, instead of performing before cold or biased observers who had never handled a blade in their lives. Unless you counted a scalpel, which he didn't. If the current situation had been more immediately lethal he could have handled it himself, or at least been a more active participant beside his two covert allies. The fact remained that however accomplished he might be in battle tactics and execution, there were fields where others than himself had a much higher chance of success, and one of those areas was decidedly public relations.

A metallic scrape touched softly on his attention. It was barely distinguishable from the regular creaks and strains the building produced as it minutely shifted itself, but he recognized the intent behind this one. He easily reached the vent opening and flipped the cover clear. A height adjusted Zack immediately stepped out and slid down the wall. He was too close to the surface for the maneuverability that would allow for a comfortable landing. Sephiroth was on the verge of intervening when Zack kicked off the wall, was briefly suspended in the foot of open air between the wall and Sephiroth, then snagged an edge of leather coat. The, currently, respected Shinra General looked down blandly as Zack swung briefly then released with a neat back flip to kill his momentum as he stuck the landing, noting that he was moving as he normally did. Sephiroth briefly considered complaining, but it wasn't as if anyone was around to see that, and it was a creative use of the environment.

"Report." He let the grating swing back into place as he turned fully toward Zack.

"Lovely to see you too, General."

Sephiroth frowned. The status effect resulted in a subtle change in Zack's voice that was definitely unsettling. He removed a remedy from inside his desk and poured the contents on Zack who burgeoned back to his usual dimensions.

"Oh, man," moaned a now normal sounding Zack. "Vertigo takes on a whole new meaning when you're coming off a mini spell."

Which was the other, unvoiced, reason Sephiroth had delegated prisoner interrogation. Thinking of prisoners...

"Was Aerith Gainsborough forthcoming?"

"It took me a while to get her to admit to her name," muttered Zack, still blinking rather woozily.

Sephiroth felt his easily kindled caution stirring. "Perhaps she isn't trustworthy." He slid into the high backed swivel chair behind his desk where he could access the pen and paper he'd set out for notes. "Did she try to deceive you?"

"Perhaps she was just skittish because she's recently been kidnapped," intoned Zack drily, apparently shaking off the last bits of motion sickness as he propped an arm on the back of the chair. "Anything in or around Shinra isn't going to be viewed very kindly."

He wasn't exactly imparting revelation-worthy information, but Sephiroth still sketched out a few details in his slightly shaky handwriting, as he liked to do when he had the chance.

"Want to dictate and I'll write what we need?"

"The notes are for personal use, not public record; neatness isn't a necessity."

He'd been conditioned and medicated since birth, and even before, to live in a state of constant anticipation, awareness, physically poised for violence. It did wonders for his combat reflexes, but it wasn't nearly so beneficial for fine motor skills. The stiff gloves he wore were usually enough to conceal that near constant tremor in his hands, if he made a conscience effort to keep them still by his sides.

"Anyway, the point is: she told me her name with only minimal prompting."

"Was she as lucid about the reasons for her capture?"

"Well..."

"She lied about that?" Words rapidly scratched into existence concerning his speculations.

"More like she was evasive. There's a difference."

"The same complications - such as death - can result from evasiveness as they can from a lie."

"Overreact much, Sephiroth? She - "

"Shall I cite you some relevant examples?"

"Fine, evasive maneuvers can have the potential for ending in bloody death, but she _did_ tell me she was an Ancient. I just had to reassure her about what a good person I am first and explain why we needed to know."

_He wouldn't. _Sephiroth slowly laid aside the pen and said evenly, "_What_ exactly did you tell her?"

"Y'know, " he said easily, sitting on the edge facing Sephiroth and bracing one foot on the opposite knee. "That we had to be - "

"You said 'we' and she is now aware that you're not operating alone."

"Yeah, let me finish. I told her we needed to know she wasn't with one of those unsavory groups that could challenge Shinra for misdemeanors."

"Zack, _telling_ the necessary expectations for acceptance make it easy for anyone to _say_ they conform to them."

"How's she supposed to be honest with us if we don't at least tell her who we are?"

"You told her our affiliation with Shinra." Slamming his head against the desk suddenly seemed like an appealing idea.

"Only mine. You're still safely shrouded in mystery."

"You told her your rank _and_ name, didn't you?"

"You realize it's hardly fair to ask for her name without introducing myself first, right?"

"You're nothing but fair," he said acidly.

Zack only laughed.

"She has all the information she needs to betray you. You can't tell random strangers sensitive information until they've proved themselves!"

"You're something of a hypocrite, Sephiroth. You get all huffy about her being leery of us, but you want me to lie to her about who I am."

"Omitting the truth is different from lying."

"I've heard you refer to them as the same thing."

"More discretion than you've been exhibiting is required for dealing with uncategorized persons."

"We're considering her as a potential ally! That means you must have some basis for trusting her!"

"_Potential_ allies still have the potential to become enemies."

Zack was inhaling for a rebuttal when Sephiroth lifted a hand, his attention focused elsewhere. With an annoyed grimace, Zack tilted his head to the side, and then a smile sparked across his features.

"Cloud's back," he stated, and launched himself off the desk.

Sephiroth pulled open the drawer again, half glad for the distraction.

"Anything in here you don't want thrown up on?"

He glanced wryly at the container plopped on his desk. "Anything in the wastebasket may be considered waste," he said mildly.

His dark haired friend grinned and went to open the vent.

"Zack!" The low voice was urgent.

"Hop on, buddy." Zack lifted the grate slightly, so Cloud could drop onto his palm, before letting it swing closed again.

Normally deeper and softer than the SOLDIER's, the mini spell affected Cloud's voice even more weirdly than it did Zack's. Sephiroth tossed another remedy, which Zack snagged with his free hand. It would have been more cost-effective, and less nausea inducing, to use a cornucopia, but he didn't want to deal with the speculation that might arise if someone found his desk stockpiled with status-specific cures. Remedies were much more nondescript.

Sephiroth stood as Zack placed Cloud on the ground, enabling him to keep the abbreviated figure in sight.

"General Sephiroth, I was able - "

"Chill for a sec, Cloud," said Zack, unstopping the vial. "You know how he freaks out over how we sound when we're small."

Cloud rapidly regained his regular stature, and Sephiroth gave him an assessing look. The young man was still rather small, but he wasn't old enough to have achieved his full growth yet so that was subject to change. He looked about as he normally did, which was to say he still retained the qualities that had struck Sephiroth as unimpressive the first few times he had seen the boy. Undeveloped build, less than stellar performance in training and on most missions. He'd incredulously said as much when Zack suggested Cloud be included in their subversive scheme.

"_That's why he's perfect!_" Zack had enthused. "_Absolutely no one will suspect him!_"

He'd agreed to accept Cloud almost solely because of his confidence in Zack. Sephiroth eventually had been able to pick out some of the qualities that the less-experienced, but not less perceptive, of the two of them had seen in the infantryman.

Cloud's official assessments were mostly unremarkable, but from personally observing him, Sephiroth had seen noteworthy leaps in his performance. The boy had very good retention for someone who hadn't undergone the SOLDIER treatment. There were two isolated incidents where Cloud had demonstrated a resolve, and improvisation in combat to a degree that had convinced Sephiroth of the genuine promise contained in the person of Cloud. What he valued even more was Cloud's unswerving loyalty.

Soldiers and SOLDIER were drilled into compliance and deference for their commanders. As long as soldiers did as they were ordered, it was considered reciprocating good form for the administration to feign oblivion if officers were verbally maligned behind their backs. Cloud never engaged in this. On the occasions he was observed by Sephiroth, Cloud hadn't interacted extensively with his fellow combatants, tending to hang around the edges. However, whenever talk turned disparaging toward their superiors, Cloud never took part. He drifted away, not even condoning it by his presence.

There had been a time when the peacekeepers that Zack had, not entirely intentionally, alienated were muttering about their most unifying sentiment: their hatred of Zack. This lingering dislike was neither healthy nor safe, and Sephiroth worried that it might eventually erupt in some kind of mass violence toward Zack. By virtue of superior hearing, Sephiroth was often privy to what the uninformed or unobservant thought was secret. Catching the harsh words from across a large room, Sephiroth had darkly been considering putting the infantrymen in their place when Cloud stepped in on Zack's behalf. Lower-ranking, less-experienced Cloud had confronted and contradicted those higher-ups on the Shinra totem pole. He was not eloquent or objectively convincing in his assertions that basically amounted to "No, you're wrong." Nonetheless, his stubborn faith impressed Sephiroth more than anything else he had seen from the soldier. It reminded him of a dark haired Second Class who had staunchly defended a deserter to the face of the General of all of Shinra. Sephiroth was convinced Zack was more worthy of the devotion than Angeal had proven himself to be.

There was that twinge of multilayer betrayal. Sephiroth had much experience with persons of the highest skill and talent, and had seen those same capable, supposedly reliant people lose their minds. He was ready to place his confidence in someone who displayed trustworthiness first and depend on tactical skills to develop afterward.

As it was, Sephiroth considered Cloud worthy of investment and Cloud himself was the only member of their group who had doubts about his usefulness. Either causing those doubts or springing from them was the fact that Cloud tended to under-perform in vital situations.

Sephiroth was fairly sure the situation would be resolved as Cloud stacked up more experience, but the cadet remained anxious. Zack was the only one completely confident.

"_Don't worry about it,_" he'd assured a depressed yet hopeful Cloud. "_It's only because you ha_v_en't figured out what it is you're protecting yet. Once you find that you're going to shock yourself with the chops you've got._"

Now, watching Cloud across the desk and waiting for the unfortunately easily induced motion-sickness that had caused Cloud to vomit every time they'd practiced this procedure, he surmised, with mild serendipity, that Cloud wasn't going to. Looking at the tightly maintained resolve, Sephiroth concluded that Cloud might have found what it was he was willing to live and die for.

"General Sephiroth, contact was successfully and...amicably established."

Zack, deciding Cloud wasn't going to need the services of the wastebasket, slid it back to its designated corner.

"You were able to convince her of your identity?" Unlike the anonymity he'd been _planning_ for Zack to maintain with Gainsborough, they'd been counting on Cloud's past relationship with the other prisoner to aid their interaction.

"She recognized me."

His gaze shot to Cloud's wildly distinctive hairstyle. Less than a hand in height and in a dark room it was apparently sufficient for identifying the infantryman. Still, Sephiroth counted it as a point in the girl's favor.

"Told you she remembered you," grinned Zack with a congratulatory nudge.

"Yeah." The stiff military stance relaxed minutely and a smile lurked on his face.

"The rumors we heard surrounding this situation, were they correct?"

"Yes, sir."

The fact was added to his sprawling network of notes, and they might have left it at that if Zack hadn't felt the need to elaborate.

"Shinra Jr. really is looking to set himself up in a more permanent relationship?"

Cloud jerked his head in affirmation, face reflecting a darker version of the determination it had already shown.

"Is there a reason she's in the prison section instead of somewhere more befitting her conceivable status?" Sephiroth directed.

Cloud's face went through a curious performance, looking torn between laughing and exploding in anger.

"Feel free to summarize, Strife."

"Thank you, sir. To summarize, Tifa Lockhart _was _placed in Rufus Shinra's level of the Shinra family apartment floors. Now, he's in the medical ward and she's in a prison cell."

"Damage incurred?" Sephiroth inquired, scribbling on the paper again.

"None."

He raised an eyebrow and waited for Strife to realize what he'd meant.

"Oh. No damage for her. Rufus Shinra is being treated for two dislocated shoulders and extensive bruising."

"She dislocated _both_ his shoulders?" asked Zack irreverently. "Was he really that determined?"

"More like she was that annoyed."

There was an appreciative whistle. "You definitely know how to pick 'em, Cloud. That is one dangerously impressive lady."

"Yeah," he muttered fondly while his expression took on a decidedly dreamy quality.

What was impressive was that they'd had someone in their group who was already acquainted with the young lady who harbored no reserves or ability for putting one of Shinra's highest ranking members in the hospital. Which meant that the person who really 'knew how to pick 'em' was Zack. Coincidental or not, Sephiroth gave him full credit for nominating Cloud as a likely member of their alliance.

"Miss Lockhart is agreeable in regards to our plan?"

Cloud nodded and Sephiroth braced himself before asking the next question. The answer seemed glaringly obvious, but considering the theoretical status the young lady would gain, inquiring seemed like the only even-handed thing to do.

"She won't regret abandoning the possibility of becoming the wife of the heir of Shinra Manufacturing?"

He didn't bother answering and the look he gave Sephiroth reminded the General that, though insecure, Cloud was far from spineless. His expression clearly showed the low opinion he had of the the fledgeling Shinra and everything associated with him. Still, Cloud was young, and Sephiroth wanted to be sure he understood everything this entailed. Ignoring Zack's derisive splutter that clearly aligned him with Cloud's opinion, Sephiroth pressed on.

"The position would certainly come with benefits; wealth and fame - "

"Or at least notoriety," muttered Zack.

Cloud leveled an all-too-knowing look at Sephiroth. "Rufus Shinra is not a faithful man."

Sephiroth felt inclined to echo Zack's low snort. That was putting it mildly. Even before his father had commissioned him with engaging in the means for a _legal_ successor, Rufus had been lasciviously free with bestowing and collecting 'favors' from every female who caught his eye. The public was carefully shielded, but everyone within the company was aware of the situation. Now, with the commission to procure an official bride, Rufus had been taking the opportunity to test drive as many candidates as possible. No one suffered from the delusion that the company heir would suddenly transition into a chaste lifestyle when he settled on a woman to marry. No man would be willing to let any woman he was even mildly fond of fall into the hands of such a person. Cloud Strife's feelings toward Tifa Lockhart were considerably more than fond.

"Cloud, you understand fully what a union with the Shinra scion entails and see a life apart from it as infinitely preferable even if hardship is involved. The most relevant question now is whether Miss Lockhart is entirely of the same opinion. Will the day arrive when she wishes she had not lost a life of riches and prestige even if it compromised her personal honor?"

In other words, would there ever be a day where she grew to hate Cloud or the lifestyle she would be embarking on with them when contrasting it to what she stood to gain living under Shinra? He didn't like to think that she was that type of girl, and Cloud's approval of her spoke well of her character, but Sephiroth was familiar with scores of men and women who had sacrificed their scruples, friends, and own bodies in the pursuit of power and pleasure. At the very least, he wanted Cloud to be prepared for the possibility that Miss Lockhart would eventually regret choosing him over Shinra.

"She didn't seem all that impressed from her personal experience with Shinra," Zack said cynically.

"It doesn't matter. " Cloud looked at Sephiroth with soul-deep confidence. "Because we're going to take down the company."

Sephiroth's expression stirred. He wouldn't be trying this unless he thought their success was more than likely, but he'd seen and experienced too much to rule out the possibility of failure. Cloud's unbending belief that they would win was both encouraging and...worrisome. Zack typically had a mindset that overlooked the likelihood of failure, but Zack also had a buoying optimism and was adept at improvising when the official plan went south. Cloud had few things he believed in wholeheartedly, and while the situations he had performed best in had been desperate, things had to get quite bad before his survival or protective instincts kicked in. In short, it was one more reason they would succeed and succeed extravagantly.

"Is there a deadline for when any sort of retribution may be exacted against Miss Lockhart?"

"From what the guards who put her in her cell said we figure they're going to move her someplace else or...do stuff to her tomorrow morning."

"She'll need to be removed tonight."

Zack shot him a speaking look. Once they broke the Lockhart girl out, that was it. They would need to commence with their plan; all of them were leaving the company and there would be no turning back. If they were freeing Aerith Gainsborough, it would have to be tonight.

He tapped the pen once against the paper and shifted slightly to allow Zack room as he half sat on the arm of the chair to read over the notes. He glanced up at Cloud's stunned expression and said wryly, "Comments, Strife?"

Cloud stared at him fixedly for a moment before hastily shaking his head without losing the vaguely horrified look stamped on his face. Good. Not just anyone could lean on Sephiroth's furniture, or himself for that matter. Zack was literally the only person he permitted the behavior from.

"So, uh," Cloud floundered, the shock apparently losing its edge. "We're breaking them out then?"

"Them?" Sephiroth queried.

"Yeah, the girl that Zack went to talk to. We're getting her out, too, aren't we?"

There was silence as both of the younger men waited for Sephiroth's response, who suddenly stood. There was a coughing gasp from Cloud and a strangled squawk from Zack as he found himself roosting on a massively unbalanced perch. Sephiroth was unworried. Zack had always managed to react quickly enough to keep himself and the chair from upending on the floor.

Sliding open the relevant drawer, Sephiroth appropriated a leather packet with a selection of cards and more traditional keys. Tossing it to Cloud, who fumbled but managed not to drop it, Sephiroth said, "Retrieve the disguises. Be sure they're concealed in one of the packages we set aside."

"Sir," said Cloud, looking more at ease. With straight-faced excitement, he nodded to Zack, and left.

While they would all effectively be losing their official rank once they made the break from Shinra, military habit died hard. Officers did not enter into arguments in front of the lower ranks.

"Disguises, plural?" Zack questioned.

Sephiroth swiveled his stance to face Zack, who now fully occupied the chair, leaning against the desk in the process. It made his skull itch to put his back to the door, but Zack was completely capable of keeping an eye on the doorway while they hashed this out.

"Having all necessary equipment here will save time if we decide to allow the Gainsborough girl."

"I've already decided."

"You are only half of 'we'."

"Cloud doesn't count?"

"One third then."

"He's on my side. Feel like coming over to the majority?"

"Democracy is rarely a pragmatic option for the military," he smiled faintly. "Are you even sure this girl is the Cetra we're seeking?"

"You are unnaturally suspicious."

"It's a conditioned response," he murmured with calm bitterness.

"She was in the right cell, she matched the description, and her name and history were what we've heard. You really think someone got wind of what we're doing and set up a double as a trap?"

Sephiroth gave him a piercing stare that showed he was considering the possibility.

"She told me the truth."

Sephiroth's gaze tightened. "Was she pretty?"

"Very," Zack grinned.

Green eyes rolled in exasperation and Sephiroth smothered a groan.

"Don't be so biased, Sephiroth. Pretty people are just as capable of honesty as the ones who aren't so easy on the eyes. Take me for instance," he preened.

"As a representative of the honest and homely category?"

"Ouch," he chuckled.

Despite the ticking time-frame and their still unresolved discussion, Sephiroth felt himself easing. Zack kicked his legs up onto the desk and Sephiroth smirked. He liked putting his feet up on the desk himself and didn't mind when Zack did the same. After an interminable childhood of brutal sterilization, it was nice to flaunt some needlessly sanitary conventions.

"I promised." The soft tone didn't quite conceal a steel strong seriousness.

All the earlier tension returned. Zack's sense of honor was at least as deeply entrenched as Angeal's had been. "Promised what?"

"That I would come back."

Relaxation flowed back. "We can deal with that."

"But you still don't want to take her with us," he said looking at him with SOLDIER blue intensity.

"I don't think we have enough reason to trust her."

"You trust me though," Zack smiled matter-of-factly.

Sephiroth returned the gesture wryly. If there was anything that marked the way they interacted, it was trust. It had been nearly automatic for both of them. With the desertion and betrayal of Genesis and their mutual friend Angeal, Sephiroth had found himself abandoned by the only friends he had while Zack was assaulted by the reality that his mentor had deserted the company and him. Amidst the confusion and swirl of possibilities and actions that followed, by respect for the man they had both been friends with and almost by necessity, they had become allies. It had been that tacit support that had seen both of them through. Whatever the turmoil and uncertainty of that time, they'd each guaranteed themselves one other person who wouldn't betray them.

The conflict with Angeal and Genesis had been especially deconstructive for Sephiroth because he could understand why they were doing it. In the aftermath, he'd done some investigating and uncovered enough disturbing facts to be willing to do almost what they had. However, he wasn't going to do it with the same disregard. So he told Zack.

After briefly proposing his plans, he'd abruptly found himself intimidated to voice the rest of what he'd planned to say. _Will you come with me?_ Zack hadn't been raised in this lifestyle like he had, Zack had chosen it. How could he ask Zack to give it up just so he wouldn't have to leave his one friend behind? He was far from Zack's only friend. Zack had friends everywhere, and he'd be leaving all of them behind if he broke from the company.

As Sephiroth hadn't asked, Zack didn't answer. He'd stepped forward looking intently at Sephiroth before sweeping his gaze into the distance for several pounding heartbeats. Then he'd nodded and said, _"Can we take Cloud with us?"_

From that point on, it hadn't been about simply leaving Shinra, but about how to dissemble the company.

"So Cloud's girl is a sure thing."

Apparently Zack was switching topics. Verbally stating their plans and their consequences did have some benefits. "Miss Lockhart's combat aptitude is an added bonus to the objective of pointing out to Shinra their non-omnipotent status. Strife's relationship to Miss Lockhart adds a dimension of necessity to her removal as well as another benefit for accepting her." Along with the opportunity to stick it to Shinra, he kept mentally savoring that aspect.

"And we'll be getting an innocent girl out of a bad situation?"

"There's also that," he acknowledged.

"Aerith's innocent too."

He frowned over the usage of the first name. Zack attached himself to people much too quickly. "Are you basing that innocence on something objective?"

"Have you ever been a believer in 'innocent until proven guilty'?"

"Never." He stepped to the open floor, the possibility that the girl in the cell wasn't the Ancient prickling around his shoulders.

"Sephiroth." Zack was out of the chair, leaning forward with both hands flat on the desk. "Nothing's changed for why we should get her out. We get to stick it to Shinra by rescuing her and we'll have the last known Cetra on our side. Whether they can get the Promised Land through her or even use it the way they want, we can't let them keep her. You know what they can do."

He looked at the door. He did know. He'd personally experienced what they could do to their own children. He felt the light touch of his abnormally natural pallid silver hair on his face and neck. His head had been shaved on a daily basis for every moment of his childhood that he could recall. It had been for sanitation, and to allow for easy access to his scalp and the often invasive methods for tracking the development of his brain. When his permanent residence had finally been moved from the scientific department to the military division, he'd promised himself he would never let his hair be cut again. Now it streamed past his knees, and only one scientist dared lay a hand on it.

When the length of his hair had started causing confusion regarding his gender, he'd simply further customized the cut of his uniform across his chest so that anyone with a basic understanding of anatomy couldn't possibly mistake him for female. Along with his face and throat, it was the only skin he showed.

The standard SOLDIER uniform was sleeveless for breathability, mobility, and intimidation. Although it was the reason for it, his 'special' status had given him the clout to refuse anything that revealed the marks that had been left on him. Skin grafts, biopsies, localized vivisections, PICC line injection sites, frequently left raw and uncovered to measure his recovery rate, had left a history of scars across his body.

There should have been more. Combat had pierced him many times, but those wounds had been quickly closed by potions or materia so there was nothing permanent to show for it. Recovery items had no effect if the flesh had already stitched itself back together. The fresh injuries disappeared, but the white smoothness and discolored roughness of imperfectly healed skin remained.

He turned back to the mark on Zack's earnest face, intersecting lines from a scar the younger man had deliberately kept. The slit skin that had been inflicted by Zack's own mentor when Angeal had been trying to coerce Zack into striking him down. He examined Zack's steadfast face, truly sincere in its estimation of Aerith Gainsborough. Zack had been equally adamant concerning Angeal, believing until the very last in the chance that their friend could be saved.

Sephiroth had shoved that mission on Zack both because of the conviction that Zack had a better chance of success and because of the crippling thought of having to kill an old friend. Sephiroth hadn't had to kill Angeal or Genesis. Zack had killed them both.

Of everything that had stampeded through him when he found out, most prevalent was the thought that he would've cut down Angeal himself to prevent the look that was on Zack's face when the SOLDIER came in with Angeal's sword on his back and clotted blood nearly obscuring the gashes on his face. There were very few things Sephiroth wouldn't be willing to do to prevent that expression from returning.

He would not allow Zack to invest himself in someone who would betray him again. Slowly, Sephiroth shook his head in a negative.

With a nonsense exclamation, Zack swung over the desk, slamming to his feet deeper inside Sephiroth's personal bubble than anyone he wasn't fighting dared to get.

"She's what she says she is. We leave her behind and we're letting Shinra have their twisted way with her and giving them the means to be a whole lot harder to take down when we make our move. She did not lie!"

"You're repeating yourself, Zack."

"You apparently weren't listening the first time. She's a fellow human being in a nasty place and we can save her. Why don't we!"

_A fellow human being_. He bit back the childish statement that Gainsborough was an Ancient, and flashed on the not so distant past when the universal appeal wouldn't have affected him. Shortly after he and Zack had determined that they would leave the company, he'd dug around for enlightenment regarding the course taken by Angeal and Genesis, and found things that made him doubt his own humanity. It had been enough to knock him off the foundation of his general actions and processes, but Zack had been encouragingly disbelieving. Without any evidence to support him, Zack had been unswerving that Sephiroth wasn't a mere creation of deranged science. Lacking motivation of his own, Zack's had been enough for Sephiroth to doggedly continue through the documents where he'd eventually been rewarded with the knowledge that experimentation had begun only after he'd been conceived. His soul had breathed again. Altered he might be, but his beginning was natural and human.

Much like now, at that time Zack had stubbornly taken a side on an issue without evidence, and been proved right.

Despite himself, the mute appeal of Zack's grip on his arm was calming. He hadn't had the opportunity to develop a resistance to positive physical contact. Angeal had nearly always maintained respectful boundaries in his interactions with others. Genesis had often invaded his space, but it was more to prove he could than to display affection. Zack had a tactile streak a mile wide.

The first time he had seen Zack, the then Second Class had a very loosely applied headlock around Angeal's neck. Angeal had tolerated it for a few seconds before throwing Zack off with a cursory, and unheeded, admonishment. Sephiroth had been fascinated by the unhesitating contact and the utter lack of apprehension surrounding it. Enough so, that he'd looked into the mentor program himself before he realized that candidates like Zack were in a nonexistent supply.

He had never experienced non-hostile physical closeness. Scientists and fans were in the same abhorred category of people who would rip off his clothes to have access to skin he wasn't at all inclined to share with them. Undemanding, companionable contact was more relaxing and fortifying than he'd allowed himself to hope.

He read the expressions his friend had never had a reason to learn how to hide. Zack was still completely convinced the girl in the cell was everything they'd heard, the actual Cetra in question and not a decoy. The possibility that she wasn't, or even that she was and might not be an individual of upright character, weren't making a dent in the sable haired man's belief. He also saw that if he absolutely refused to take the girl, Zack would agree, because Zack trusted him too. He'd be insane not to strive to be worthy of that.

"You may go back," he said distinctly. "But you will ask her two questions, delivered only in the manner I dictate, and you may bring her only if she answers both questions correctly..."

* * *

><p>AN: I went through a struggle deciding who to put as the primary character for this fic because Sephiroth so decidedly dominates the middle of it and Zack is the only character to appear in all three chapters (though fortunately there's been a site revision that allows for the listing of more than one character from one side of a crossover), but starting with Aerith gave her a leg up in the competition and I figured it'd be best to give her top shelf. At this point, the FMA version of this fairy tale/parody is decisively in the lead, which surprised me a bit, as I haven't done anything in the FMA-verse up to this point and didn't know what to expect. Thanks for reading the (statistically) lesser of the two tales!


	3. The End

**Name Me**

_The End_

By FullMentalPanic

"Aerith, wake up!"

She startled upwards with a spasm of thunder and quaking in chest. This was wrong. It was too dark. It was too early. She wasn't supposed to be here. It - she -

The pounding flutter of her heart slowed as reality established itself. She was in a Shinra cell and it was only dark because they hadn't turned on the lights. Panic stilled, but it steadied into a fear that rational thought only confirmed; she wasn't supposed to be here.

She instantly missed the oblivion she'd been roused from. Which meant she'd actually fallen asleep after all. So it followed that she'd been woken up by -

"Can I come in yet? There should be enough time, but it's not really the best idea to let things sit on the back burner right now."

- a chance.

"You came back!" She scrambled to her feet on top of the cot and inexpertly scrabbled her fingers around the edges of the grate.

"Hey, promises were made to be kept."

Locking onto that luminescent blue as the metal swung upwards, she had to catch her hands in mid-flight from snatching him off the lip of the vent. With an effort, she leveled a palm beneath the opening and felt her breath loosen at the immediate pressure as he stepped on.

"What time is it?" she asked, bringing her hand to the heighth of her face and trying to make him out more clearly. She'd had quite a bit of time to adjust to the darkness, and there were subtle shades of gray that she guessed to be the outlines of his form and a startling hairstyle. However, it was difficult to focus on anything but the two points of light.

"2:00 a.m.-ish."

"So then," her free hand clenched and she breathed in taut anticipation, "we are escaping tonight."

"It...yeah...depends..."

She felt hollow from throat to stomach. "What does that mean?"

"Calm down," he soothed. "I'm totally fine with you, but the other part of the 'we' isn't even sure you're an Ancient."

Exactly what she'd always been trying to convince Shinra. She stifled a spasmodic giggle. Irony could wait. "What do I have to do?"

"Just some tests, like to prove you're a Cetra, and you are, so there's nothing to be worried about."

"And if I don't pass?"

"You will, you don't have to feel worried."

She felt sick.

This was it though, and as slick and unsettled as her insides were right now, the only clear way out was right in front of her. "What's the test?"

"There's that fighting spirit! Okay, do you know any of the names of the people in the SOLDIER program, besides mine?"

"Not really," she winced. What was that saying about knowing your enemies? It was probably why she'd been captured.

"That's fine. Now I'm not responsible for the wording here, so bear with me. 'Wisdom and mercy unite for victory. Beauty crowns the foundation of the kingdom. Intelligent strength and justice forms majesty. Count to ten, divide by three, join the pillars, and name me.'"

She swayed a little. "Could you repeat that?"

"Sure." He did.

It seemed to get even more confusing the second time around. "It's so...quasi-poetic," she hedged.

"Yeah, the influence of Lo - uh, friend...ish...stuff."

"How many tries do I have?"

"Well, it's one of those all or nothing situations, so just one."

Of course. A swallow couldn't make it past her throat. Her mind pushed against the riddle but it showed absolutely no sign of budging. How did this connect to being an Ancient?

"Don't feel like you have to stand up the whole time, unless you think better on your feet."

She all but collapsed onto the mattress, before belatedly noticing that her hand had dropped out from under Zack and he was clinging to her skin in lieu of having gravity to give him firm footing.

"Are you alright?" she gasped, cupping her other hand around the first and trying not to squeeze as she felt him squirm back to his feet.

"Yeah," his voice puffed in laughter. "Actually it was kind of a rush."

Sighing with relief, and a hint of exasperation, she leaned her head against the smooth metal of the wall, letting texture and temperature focus her thoughts.

Her efforts were unsuccessful.

"You've got this, Aerith. You have everything you need to figure this out."

"Are you allowed to give hints?" she countered dully.

"I'm not giving hints," he intoned righteously. "I'm being encouraging. Questions are pointless if you don't already have the pieces, you just have to reach back far enough for them."

"Far enough," she repeated without much hope. Back to things she really didn't want to remember, but that was the only time when Cetra knowledge could have taken root. That had been the only time her mother had been alive to tell it to her. Childhood, parents -

_Father_.

Ice shattered and dripped in glassy splinters. She couldn't remember him at all, whether he had been kind or cruel, gentle or rough. It didn't matter though. Whenever the thought of him crossed her mind, one fact stood above everything else: he hadn't been strong enough to save them.

Her eyes slid closed, and her free hand twisted into the fabric of her skirt. The rough rip of tearing cloth reminded her that nothing she was wearing would be sturdy enough to act as a lifeline. Her fingers twitched at soft movement on her upturned palm.

"Hey, you okay?"

Opening her eyes she looked on the steady, blue glow radiating out of her hand. Didn't he ever blink? Unless he turned away, the light of his eyes had always been constant.

"Are you timing your blinks with mine?"

There was finally a flicker in that light and a slightly embarrassed chuckle. "Should I stop?"

"No, it's fine." It couldn't illuminate anything, but it was always there. There were very few things she'd been able to hang onto. People slipped away from her, even her flowers that burst to life under her hands could only live so long before they withered and went to seed. As evidenced by her current predicament, she could be separated from the steadiness of the earth, and there were whispering fears in her mind that even that foundation was dying.

Breathing slowly, she tried to tear her mind away from the awareness of transiency she usually ignored. One of the clearest memories of what her childhood had taught her was that loving something didn't mean that it was safe or that it could keep her from harm. When she was very young she had thought that it did. She didn't like to remember it because it so obviously wasn't true. Now though, she faced that time when she had fully believed that the shadows couldn't touch her.

Mother had made it so easy to laugh. There had been strange men, and strange, harsh lights, but none of them had seemed truly frightening when her mother smiled. They had always been asking questions, trying to get her to give answers that she didn't understand. Mother had replied easily, speaking quickly and carelessly while pencils scratched over paper until the men started to look frustrated and then left in a huff. After that, all Mother's attention would be for Aerith, her light voice filling Aerith's world while they ran from side to side of the windowless room they lived in. Mother knew wonderful games of all sorts ; for singing, jumping, rhyming, clapping, drawing, dancing. The best thing about them was that they had usually kept the tall men away.

Sometimes the men had asked questions about the games; dry, slow questions that seemed to totally miss the point of the fun. Mother would eagerly demonstrate the hand motions, hopping steps, and accompanying animal sounds, that Aerith still hadn't heard from their original source, urging them to join in the play. At which point the men would stomp out of the room looking disgusted and offended, and she and Mother would laugh at how silly they were not to enjoy any of the games.

The numbers game, counting in the soft throaty words that she'd never heard anyone else use. Kether, h'akmah, binah; words that resonated as she clapped her tiny palms against her mother's larger ones. Meaning that was attached and inherent along with number value sprang into her mind as it had when they'd softly chanted together; the crown, wisdom, intelligence... Her breath caught. There were ten of them! H'esed, pah'ad, tiphereth; mercy, strength and justice, beauty...

"Say the riddle again!" she demanded, leaning forward with her fist against the mattress.

"Wisdom and mercy unite for victory." There was pleased excitement in each clearly stated syllable.

"H'akmah, h'esed, netsah," she whispered triumphantly.

"Beauty crowns the foundation of the kingdom."

"Tiphereth, kether, yesod, malkuth."

"Intelligent strength and justice forms majesty."

"Binah, pah'ad, hod!" She tightened her fist in response as he stepped forward to the heel of her upturned palm.

"Count to ten, divide by three, join the pillars, and name me."

Ten numbers, each with its own attributes. Three groups, two with three numbers, and one with four -

"You've got it?" He shifted on her skin, and even with her eyes closed she could feel the intensity of his gaze.

"SHHH!" she hushed fiercely.

Those three groups were known as amudim, pillars...the Pillar of Love...the Pillar of Mercy...the Pillar of Judgement. Together they were known as the -

"Sephiroth," she exhaled.

He didn't say anything.

"Was that right?" she asked worriedly.

"Yeah."

"I was right!" She held back from clapping her hands in excitement, and grasped her wrist instead so she wouldn't squish Zack. Twirling from her knees to her feet, tension escaped in jumping laughter. Shinra cots weren't very conducive to bouncing, but she didn't care. She was halfway there! If she got one question right, she could succeed on the other one too!

"What's the next one?" Her skirt twisted around her legs before flowing smoothly as she spun to a stop. "It's another Cetra question, right?"

He moved away from where he'd been anchored to her thumb. "...Just give an honest response, okay?"

She nodded brightly. "Sure."

"After this next one, I'm really not allowed to say anything until you answer or everything else turns void and I have to leave without you."

This time the reluctance and content of his words knocked aside her euphoria. She paused with lips parted on questions she didn't know how to phrase. Was there really anything to say? It seemed forebodingly clear-cut. Looking down at the clear shine of his eyes, she was annoyed as the energy of her success drained and her body and mind remembered it was beyond the middle of the night.

"Is it bad somehow?" came stupidly from her mouth, even though she already knew the answer.

"I can't say."

"Then ask," she whispered.

"I'm not allowed to help directly. I'm still here though, sending good thoughts!"

"..."

"Okay," he sighed. Then his voice changed, went rigid and controlled and expressionless as what he said next was chopped by his tongue. "'You will be taken from this cell, protected and rescued, if and only if you will deliver the life of your first child into my hands.'"

She blinked. She didn't have any children, firstborn or otherwise, and what this meant...Seeping horror brought wakefulness back to her brain. She was the last of the Cetra, who said that whatever they wanted to do to her was any better than what Shinra was planning? Except, it was stated that she'd be spared from it, if she would let them inflict it on her child.

Her gaze locked onto his desperately, imploring for some indication that this wasn't the situation she thought it was. He didn't blink or look away, but that was all. He wasn't going to say or do anything else. Briefly, she contemplated tilting him off her palm. With a shaky exhale, she wrapped her free arm around her stomach. She didn't want to push him away, but whether she did or not didn't change the fact that she was going to have to give her answer completely on her own, and soon. There were only so many hours before the day began and he would leave for good.

She didn't have a child though, her thoughts kept circling around that pertinent fact. Maybe it wasn't even possible for her in the first place. She wasn't a full Cetra, only half. If she was half-human and half-Ancient, maybe she was like a mule; sterile. Could she risk the life of her child on a chance? She could just decide never to have children; never marry, have an operation, eat nothing but lard and sugar and become thoroughly unappealing. Even as she weighed the options, she balked at skirting around the specific wording of the demand. What if, through whatever circumstances, she did end up with a child? Could she condemn that unborn person to whatever Sephiroth had planned and foreswear any responsibility toward that dependent little life? What did they want to do to her baby? That they wouldn't talk about it made her irrevocably certain that it was something terrible. Would it be like what had happened to her? What should she do? What would her mother do?

She flashed on the time spent in that small windowless room with a cleaness that hurt her eyes and seemed dead. Her mother flippantly declaring that Aerith wouldn't know anything of importance, convincing them to leave her daughter in the cell while she'd been taken away for hours on end. Sometimes her mother had only able to smile silently when she was returned.

Still, there had been so much laughter; over games, over hugs, over how little the men who watched them and questioned them seemed to understand of what was going on. She had been so confused at how they treated her mother, with so many questions but acting like none of her answers mattered and leaving whenever Mother got to any of the really fun parts. She'd asked her mother about it quietly, why the men didn't realize how smart she was. She had smiled and tapped a finger on Aerith's nose. "_Sometimes the smartest thing you can do is let people think you're silly." _Aerith had thrilled at her mother's undefeaftable cleverness. In the end though, all of that laughter, and all of that love, hadn't been enough to keep her safe.

They had accepted less and less her mother's excuses for her daughter as Aerith had grown older. She'd been taken one day, from where she'd been playing with a doll that had taken weeks for her mother to intricately twist out of old clothes. One moment she had been on the hard floor, and the next she was high in the air against an unfamiliar shoulder. Her mother's voice had risen, climbing from the playful tone it nearly always rested at to a shrillness that made Aerith's ears hurt and heart race before the door slammed it silent. She had always felt safe when her mother picked her up and held her, now she felt trapped and scared, and hugged her doll close. She had to be brave, because Dolly couldn't do anything to escape. So Aerith had kicked and squirmed, and when she did her doll slipped from her hands and flopped limply to the floor. Nothing she did, or said, or cried would stop the man so she could go back and rescue it. A door had closed on the sight of what she lost and she never saw it again.

That had been the first time she'd met _him_. He didn't have eyes, just shiny flashing circles on his face. Everyone, she, her mother, the mean men, they all had eyes and she could see what they were in them. Not him, he was the body without a soul. He had reached toward her and she couldn't back away.

Aerith's eyes blinked open to the darkness of her cell. This was what she would be subjecting her child to. This was not what parents did to their children. You did not surrender your own flesh and blood to save even your own life.

"No."

Zack whooped.

She started as a thin, half band of warmth wrapped around her wrist. She jerked her arm upward. Zack came with it and she found herself blinking in bafflement at joyously blazing blue.

"I said no."

"You're brilliant! You did it! I know you said no, that's why you're awesome!"

She was too tired to figure this out. "What?"

"Sephiroth was testing your character," he laughed between words. "He didn't want to help you if you were the kind of person who would give up her own child to save herself. No, was the right answer."

"Oh," she said faintly before her emotions marching resolutely toward martyrdom abruptly about-faced. "So that means - "

"Yeah! Grab your boots, girl, we're going to be out of Shinra within the hour!"

A smile rallied and spread from her heart to her face. Glancing eagerly into the shadows she hesitated. "I don't know where they are."

Zack bounced off her palm, and two lights sauntered to the edge of the cot. "There's one right below me, the other one's a few hundred - a few feet to the left by the wall."

She slid to the floor, shivering at the chill that crept through her thin socks and skirt, but her hands soon encountered the soft mass she was feeling for. "Sorry I threw this at you."

"You did, didn't you, and I completely forgot to mention it to Sephiroth too."

"Would that have changed things?" Finding her other shoe, she straightened and sat on the edge of the mattress, trying to determine which was the left foot fit and which was the right.

"He's pretty leery of anything he thinks could come back to bite any of us. He'll warm up to you though."

Her fingers slipped off the edges of her boot and her foot slammed the rest of the way in as it smacked into the floor. "I have to meet him?"

"Well yeah, you'll be seeing a lot of him. He's the guy in charge, though I hold an impressive amount of influence."

"That's good," she ventured, sitting with her arms straight and clamped to the edge of the cot as she wiggled her other foot into her shoe.

"It _is _good," he said confidently, and she looked down as she felt him touch against her wrist. "So there's no reason to dilly-dally. Can I snag a hand to the grating?"

She raised her chin and breathed in. She'd done it, passed all of their tests. There was nothing anyone should get upset about, including her. Letting out her breath she smiled and offered a palm for Zack to step onto before getting up herself. As he slipped into the vent, there was a flash of muted light.

"What?"

"Small materia. I was supposed to leave it around the corner of the next vent, but I didn't want to have to go back for it. Fortunately anything you're wearing or holding shrinks along with you so I just had to grab a cloth to cover it with."

"Who were you hiding it from?"

"Well, you in case you didn't meet Sephiroth's standards. This is your way out of here," he patted the sphere of dim light and was silhouetted in green.

"So you'll shrink me?" The lurking idea that she'd be going out the front door faded. She'd only heard the vaguest of rumors surrounding this kind of thing, and usually sandwiched in between stories of materia that would make your hair grow, fix kitchen appliances, or turn you into a frog. Apparently there was some truth to this one because...Zack had been shrunk. What was he like when he wasn't tiny?

"He didn't come right out and say it, but this is actually part of the test too. I can't work materia when I'm downsized, so you're going to have to cast it."

That in itself didn't seem too hard. It was the possibility of Sephiroth laying more traps where she could lose her freedom that had her hands feeling cold. "How should I do that without getting stuck down here?"

"Grab onto the bottom of the vent and I'll hold the materia against your fingers so you can cast. When it takes effect you'll already be holding onto the edge and I can pull you up."

She put both hands over the lip of the vent, unconfident in her upper body strength to keep her from plummeting from a height that was about to turn lethal. Her head was craned up, but she could still barely see inside where Zack should have been standing. She jumped at the tingle of materia on her fingertips and leaned back, trying to see into the vent.

"Make sure you're really pressing into the wall, we don't really know which way you'll shrink. I'll help you up as soon as you're small enough. No offense, but you're a little more than I can handle at the moment."

"Hmm," she intoned, wondering if she should spare the energy to play offended then decided it was more important to make sure she didn't succumb to nerves and back away. Stepping as close as possible to the wall, awareness of the materia and what it was meant for seemed to flow down her arm and tickle around her temples. A dim visual of a point of light growing smaller and smaller flashed in front of her eyes.

"Here I go," she stated uncertainly, but she didn't tap into the swirl of power she could feel practically breathing under her fingers.

"I'm ready," he assured, and she felt barely discernible pressure against one of her nails. Plastering herself further against the wall, she focused on the materia and _pulled_.

Her skin was coated in warmth, crown to sole, and then the sensation drove into her core and turned cold. It was a chill, expanding vacuum that she was being dragged into. She felt like she was falling, because she actually was.

Falling, slipping, her hands flat and scraping down the wall without slowing -

Something heated and firm wound around her middle and swept her up against solid warmth, alive and huge. She latched on and clung to it as gravity dropped away with a jerk and she was just swinging with a heartbeat next to her ear.

"Got you." The voice brushed though her hair, resonated next to her for the first time in a way that made her think 'guy'.

The scream that had gotten caught in her throat when she was falling made her voice squeak. "Zack?"

"Yep."

There was a heave and swing, and everything seemed to flip and turn sideways, and then there was firmness under her knees. She breathed fast, her skin twitching in an echo of her pounding heart. She started when she felt him shift.

"I'm gonna get the grate closed and then we can go," he said quietly. She felt him easing back and realized he was crouched around her with arms nearly enveloping her waist and back. Scuttling back, she sat shivering at the loss of contact and temperature with her legs folded to the side. The green materia was too glaring to be anything other than a bright spot in darkness, and she couldn't see anything around her clearly. She straightened with a gasp as something settled on her shoulder.

"Watch, I'll be finished in second," his voice bounced cheerfully off walls that sounded too close yet still too far away to see.

Then the pressure lifted, and she blinked at moving shadows until she could make out the lighter dimness that was the vent opening, leading back to what had been her cell. A solid shape detached from the darkness then flitted out completely, seeming to hang suspended in space for an instant before shifting to a higher level and bounding out of sight completely. Aerith had a moment to process that Zack had grabbed onto, swung up on, and jumped off of the grating, before he came crashing down onto it again. It dipped, but not enough to close. In the beat before it sprung back into place, Zack dropped to the underside of the metal cover and wrenched downward. Inching past the point of resistance, the grating was suddenly rushing toward the vent opening. They collided with a crash that shook all four walls and Aerith could feel on the inside of her teeth. Calmly, Zack let go and stepped off his perch on the inside of the cover.

She laid her hand where his had been. It had covered her neck to shoulder, collarbone to nearly the bottom of her shoulder blade. A minute ago that hand would have fit on one of her fingertips. She needed some time to adjust to this.

He hefted the green globe to his shoulder like one of the drums of salvaged Mako hauled around under the plate, and then the blue she'd seen flickers of as he moved about was steady on her once more. She pushed to her feet quickly, ready to move on, standing straight and as tall as she could. His eyes were still well above hers.

"All set?" His voice was over her head. Well, most adults' were, but she didn't spend her first few hours of acquaintance with most people with them fitting in the palm of her hand.

For some reason, the green of the materia seemed to feed the blueness of his eyes instead of drowning it out. Other than that, it wasn't useful in illuminating his features. She could barely discern that he seemed to be humanly normal, let alone discover what he actually looked like. When the light swung slightly to the side, it did show enough for her to realize that he was holding out his hand for her.

She'd been holding him for most of the time that she'd known him, but taking his hand now that they were the same size seemed more intimate, and she shied away from it. Having something solid to hang onto in a near pitch environment would be nice though, and she decided that linking arms would be more appropriate...if he'd had sleeves. When she touched bare skin in the crook of his arm and her hand settled over the slow rhythm of his pulse she was on the verge of switching to his gloved hand, but he was already moving forward.

"Off we go," he whispered. "Remind me to be quieter if I forget. Sound carries like you wouldn't believe in here."

"Big booms from closing grates don't count?" she questioned pointedly while quickening her pace to match his longer and faster stride.

"Random clangs are normal for metal buildings, or this one at any rate. Voices in vents are suspicious."

As she was guided into a right hand turn she wondered aloud, "just how well can you see?"

"You're biting your lip, and that tiny pocket on the side of your skirt is only half buttoned."

She released her skin from her teeth and checked the pocket by touch. It was as he'd said. Wonderful, now she was suddenly self-conscious about how she looked. Resisting the urge to tactiley fix her hair, she still straightened her posture. He'd probably noticed, if his eyesight was really that good. She needed to distract herself.

"What would've happened if I had known his name?"

"The process would just be reversed, the question would be about why he was named that with more cryptic clues leading up to it. Good thing you didn't know his name though. I had the riddle that went along with that option memorized better."

"How long until we get there?" Hopefully he wouldn't be annoyed by the variation on 'are we there yet', and she truly wanted to know how long she had to prepare before her first encounter with Sephiroth.

"Our temporary base is some floors down, which should go fast with gravity on our side. It's a little bit of a hike from there with how fast we're going, so probably ten to twenty minutes."

As long as twenty minutes to get up her nerve, as quick as ten minutes to become frazzled, or vice versa. Zack's arm seemed to tug against her hand a bit harder, but that was because she was slowing down.

"Tired?"

She quickly stepped faster. "No."

Almost at once she was pulled to a halt, and she looked uneasily up at Zack's profile.

"Here we are. Cloud's already been and gone, so once I pick this up we can be on are way." His arm slipped away from her, and the materia was shifted down to the floor. She moved after him, but a strong updraft of cold air whooshed into her and had her stepping back again. They were right on the edge of something very high.

"Who's Cloud?" She stretched her hands cautiously out to the sides, but she couldn't find anything to steady herself.

"Third part of the 'we'. He's in the infantry. He also knows the girl who was slated for a corporate wedding with Rufus Shinra." Something long and coiled was held next to the orb of faint light. "He moved this part over so I know he and Tifa already made it down and I can pack this up."

She edged closer to the materia, her single visual point of reference. "Won't _we_ need it to get down?"

"For me it's faster just to jump. Unless you'd feel better climbing down?" Blue eyes looked back at her and dulled the edge of her tension.

"What's easiest for you?" she inquired warily. Sliding down a rope, or something like it, wouldn't be that difficult, if she was well-rested and not blind or shaky. She'd rather have his help.

"If you hang onto my back." His light blinked out as he turned. "You'll have something to hold onto and I'll still have a hand free for the materia and the rope. I'll kick off the walls on the way down so we won't land too hard for you. Will that work?"

"...Yes." She wouldn't be excessively comfortable with it, but she was more easy with it than the other options.

The outlines of his back were shown as he crouched and lifted the green glow to his left shoulder. His eyes turned toward her and he offered, "climb on."

Getting aboard mostly by feel, and when she was wearing a dress, was awkward. With a little maneuvering, she had her ankles crossed in front of him and her skirt tucked securely around her legs not _too_ high. She looped her arms around his neck, then ducked her head as her face brushed against his hair. It smelled clean, like water and that scrap of leafy, living wood that had been trapped in an odd container of building supplies.

His right hand closed over where hers were welded together. "No choking please."

He jumped.

It was like a cold shower that was shooting up from the drain instead of flowing from the faucet. She clamped tighter to his heat while her eyes locked open and streamed in the rushing wind. The light, mossy gleam of the materia spread in front of them on something flat and vast, something they were about to run into. She was thinking it might help if she leaned back when they abruptly slowed, but in a way that was like they'd hit something rubbery. Then they sped away into nothingness and were once more plummeting through an expanse of black. Her brain clicked to a solution, the materia light was reflecting of a wall of the vent. Zack had kicked off of it, and in such a way that it wasn't like falling face first on the floor of her church. Then he did it again, and again, and again, and again.

Finally, Zack straightened after one of the impact absorbing landings and they weren't moving anymore.

"Are you breathing?"

Apparently not. She took a great, gasping gulp and noticed that his stomach and ribs were stiffening in what was probably an effort not to laugh.

"But I didn't scream," she stated, primly pleased with herself.

"Nope, you're tough." His hand patted hers before encircling them again. "Would you like to get down, or should we see how fast I can run?"

She swallowed another mouthful of air. Her heart was dancing madly in her chest; she didn't feel like loosening her grip in the slightest, but there was an energy zipping through her blood. She wanted to do something fast.

"Let's run."

"Let's," Zack agreed, refraining from pointing out they would be moving under his power.

It felt almost as swift as the drop. The only differences were that they no longer narrowly avoided running into walls, and it was the tangible ripple of muscle over bone that was propelling them forward. Eyes slitted against the dark draughts, she wondered if it would still take ten minutes of travel time, and if it would be rude to think about it aloud since he might be out of breath.

"How long now?" she asked with a lilt to show she wouldn't be offended if he didn't answer.

"At this rate," came his voice sounding anything but short-winded, "about a minute."

Now she was wishing she'd opted for a little more time to prepare. She rearranged her arms, and one of them settled against his neck so that his pulse throbbed against her skin. It was still slower than she would've thought, and she centered on the regular cadence until her own heartbeat started to calm.

He swung around a corner and a stark panel of light burst into sight.

"They left it open for us."

A second later they were right on the edge of a depth of brightness. Her eyelids fluttered at a contrast of light and spikes of darkness. His hair, she realized, and sheltered her stinging eyes behind it.

"Hang on."

She did so before thinking why she should, and closed her lips over a yelp when he leaped. Blazing light surrounded them absolutely, and she pinched her eyes closed against it. They landed on something and Zack stopped, but...they were still moving. She looked up briefly at wildly swirling flames of luminescence that she couldn't make sense of before shutting it out again. The world was spinning, dipping, and then still. She felt Zack step forward and down.

He released his grip on her, and she took the prompt, bracing her hands against whatever covered his shoulders and sliding off his back. She left the fingers of one hand against the fabric of his clothes, letting herself know he was still there.

"Cloud's going to pour a Remedy on us and we'll go normal," he pronounced softly.

She nodded, and peeked out at their surroundings. Her sense of sight was still overwhelmed. Everything around her was blobby, but there were enough shapes for her to guess she'd be seeing clearly within a minute.

"Oh, and it's probably going to make you sick to your stomach."

"What?" Then she was spluttering under a splash of liquid.

One time her mom had brought home a facial cream that dried stiffly on your skin and made it feel confined and small. This was like that, except now the hardened liquid stretched the skin it stuck to instead of shrinking it. Any progress her eyes had made was cast into confusion as her perspective snapped and swelled. She stumbled and looked down, her feet were miles upon miles away, dropping down, they would never stop. Something swung into her vision like the curve of the barricade the separated the slums from the wastelands; her arm. All in all, she felt distinctly nauseous.

Hands pressed over her mouth, she teetered forward. Some kind of container was held in front of her; a bowl, a trashcan? Whatever it was, its purpose was clear, and she hastily snatched it and leaned over. She was vaguely aware of her braid spilling over her shoulder and on its way to swinging in front of her mouth, when it was caught and held against her back. Her bangs and the curls coiled next to her throat were smoothed clear of her face. After a few harsh breaths, it seemed she would be able to walk away from this with only a dribble of bile slipping from her lips and an acidic burn in her nose. She was instantly glad she hadn't eaten in awhile. To think she'd been upset that she hadn't been given food because she was being prepped for surgery. Sniffing, and wiping hurriedly at her nose, she straightened up, realizing that her chances of a good first impression were utterly ruined.

The trashcan faded back as she rubbed her eyes into working order. Looking across the room, her gaze caught on spines of pollen-yellow and then dropped to the tentatively inquiring stare below them. Was that Sepiroth? She hoped so, curiosity wasn't as daunting as hostility. Dredging up a bright smile, she realized he was flanked by a girl with masses of dark hair. Both of them stood straight, watching her, but they were so close that their arms pressed together. That must be the girl who was also rescued, which meant that was probably Cloud next to her. So then - she shifted to the left barely noticing that her smile had been mirrored by the girl and slowly echoed by Cloud when -

Oh. _That_ was Sephiroth.

Her expression of friendly politeness was sliced and slain by his stare. He was all contrast; sheets of silver-white hair and skin that seemed even paler than hers above the binds of his black clothes. His eyes bored against her, giving the impression that the only reason he wasn't drilling out all of her secrets was that he didn't quite think she was worth it.

He was definitely hostile.

She faltered back a step, then stilled as she ran into something. Zack; her heart sprang up as her awareness of him skipped from the back row to the front seat. She looked up, it felt like a full foot, before she found eyes that were vivid even when they were surrounded by light. He gave her a lightning flash of a smile, that didn't give her nearly enough time to get a good look at his features, then stepped forward and half in front of her, trashcan swinging from his left hand.

"Good news, Sephiroth. Aerith really is an Ancient, and impeccably ethical to boot." There was an added timbre to his voice, and she got a full view of his height and breadth, not to mention his eye-catching cacophony of inky hair, as he nudged Sephiroth's attention to himself, away from her. This was Zack.

Sephiroth didn't say anything and Aerith's stomach started to heave in panicked circles.

"Right, official first meeting and all that," knowingly drawled Zack. He snapped up, straight and military. "Behind the desk is our respectably imposing leader Sephiroth. Intimidation is one of his natural talents. He does it without thinking about it."

Sephiroth's glare was turned full force on Zack.

"And sometimes it's completely intentional," Zack cheerily placated. "To your right are country kids Cloud and Tifa," he paused and shot a smile at Cloud's amused snort. "Everyone I just named, Aerith Gainsborough."

She knew a cue when she heard one. This was a group that she was thoroughly involved with now, and she decided she wasn't going to look at any of them with fear. Her emotions would come to the same conclusion eventually. She stepped to Zack's side and met Sephiroth's eerie green eyes steadily.

Sephiroth stood up.

He was taller than Zack. She was stiffening up and thinking of of scurrying backwards when Zack's hand knocked against hers. She latched onto it, thinking briefly he might have done it on accident, but then his fingers curled firmly around hers. Righting her posture, she realized that Sephiroth's eyes were now locked disapprovingly on where her hand was joined with Zack's.

Emboldened by Zack's grip, she held her head defiantly, remembering all the turmoil and relived grief she'd gone through because of the tests of the man in front of her. Sephiroth's stare became even harsher, and she had a flash of understanding that she could sabotage whatever working relationship she might have with him. She had an advocate in Zack, but that clearly put him at odds with Sephiroth and she realized keenly that many things could be destroyed if she decided to act prickly. Sephiroth's demeanor was anything but congenial, but, she squared her shoulders and tightened her hold on Zack's hand, she could be the bigger person.

"Mr. Sephiroth," she pushed aside all her dissatisfaction and focused on where she was right now. "Thank you, and Zack, for getting me out of that cell." She took a step forward holding out her hand. This gesture didn't really exist in the slums, as it just gave people an opportunity to yank you close and snatch your purse or stab your stomach. However, she'd heard that it could be used above the plate to express politeness, respect, and trust.

Sephiroth just stared, but she gamely kept her hand out, her tension only showing in the pressure she was putting on Zack's fingers. Sephiroth's gaze drifted over to Zack's, then he grudgingly raised his hand and clasped Aerith's.

"You're welcome." His voice was very deep but somehow...dry. As if there was something unwatered and brittle buried there. It fell by the wayside to what she felt in his grasp. It was strong, undoubtedly, and the way he shook her hand seemed to proclaim he was only using a fraction of his power. Still, there was a thread of something, thin but wound through everything she could sense in him, wired and taut. It was also beyond his control, there was a fine quiver vibrating through it constantly and his hand trembled slightly in time with it.

"...your hand," she murmured, striving to sort out and define the sensation. Any equanimity they'd been able to scrape together with their halting pleasantries was swept aside. He stiffened almost enough to disguise the shaking, and immediately withdrew despite her efforts to hold on.

He'd become aggressively defensive so decisively she could practically see the barricades around him. Her frustrated protest sunk back into her throat as she took a deeper look at his reaction. This wasn't just about him distrusting her, it was a nearly universal wariness that she was currently bearing the brunt of. He was certainly paranoid, but that had probably stemmed from something real because that tight energy pulling and straining through his body didn't belong there. If he was moving against Shinra now, it wasn't too hard to guess who'd put him in this state. She still didn't feel like she was quite on his side, but she knew she wasn't on theirs, and if she could undo something Shinra had fouled she wanted to try.

"I can fix it," she stated before she'd considered it as more than a possibility.

"Really?" Zack leaned into her field of vision looking hopeful while Sephiroth raised a blatantly disbelieving eyebrow.

"Yes." Momentarily distracted with finally getting to categorize the arrangement of Zack's face, she resolutely refocused on Sephiroth so he would know she was serious. It would probably take a fully mastered Heal and lengthy sessions to chip away at what had long been ingrained in his being. However, she was confident that she would be able to untangle the turmoil that buzzed under his skin.

"Cetra are supposed to be legendary with first aid," Zack mused.

Sephiroth fixed her with a darkly accusing look. "Battle efficiency will be crucial in the coming months. Replacing reflexes I'm accustomed to with ones I haven't had time to train with could be disastrous."

He was trying to make it sound like she was looking for ways to make him weaker! She flushed with annoyance and opened her mouth to fling something mocking at him. Zack's thumb moved over her knuckles and she swallowed her first retort to give a counter-offer instead.

"Afterward then. When everything's been taken care of and you'll have time to adjust to something new, then I'll heal you." There, she was committed now, to sticking with them until this was all over and proving that she would back up what she said.

They stood with contesting eyes while he probed her intent and weighed her words...and found them sufficient. He was still guarded, but there was a resolve and willingness to allow her closer. This time he was the one who extended a hand.

"Accepted."

She shared a triumphant squeeze with Zack.

* * *

><p>Sephiroth somewhat loathed anniversaries. Battles and victories deserved some acknowledgement, but public celebrations didn't appeal to him. He didn't like being stared at now any more than he had in the past. Then he'd been forced to endure it, now the only thing that could pressure him into parades were social connections, which weren't terribly compelling.<p>

Zack did like being stared at, though Aerith didn't, but he had his own anniversary to tend to. Which meant Sephiroth was the one looking after the kids, who were completely impervious to his glares. He would have expected as much from Zack's offspring, but even Cloud's failed to be cowed by him. How could they tell he didn't mean it?

He conducted another scan over the group of small children who seemed to have no qualms about a day away from their respective parents. Determining that all was well and there wasn't anything in the area suicidally inclined to hassle them, he pushed soft cotton fabric up his arm. He still favored long sleeves for virtually every occasion, but gloves were no longer a necessity and there was a line of demarcation on his wrist between the skin tones of his hand and his arm. He stretched it up against the blue sky and let the sun seep into his palm, marveling anew on how he could hold it absolutely steady. Aerith had been as good as her word.

A small hand reached for him, and he bent to grasp it. They didn't seem to notice his scars. It couldn't be indefinite, but if he could get used to them as they did, maybe he would reach the point where he didn't mind talking about them when they finally asked. Aerith teased about how she'd ended up trusting him with her firstborn, and second and third, after all. It was only natural though; it was a godfather's prerogative.

* * *

><p>AN: Sephiroth is actually an old Hebrew word, so I assumed that in the game he was given an Ancient name and therefore parallels could be drawn between the Cetra and the Hebrew people and language, which is what the riddle is based on. The Fairy Tale this was tied to, which I seriously skewed to fit my own tastes, was Rumplestiltskin. Cloud, Zack, and Sephiroth were all representations of Rumplestiltskin, Tifa and Aerith split the role of the miller's daughter, and Shinra in general and in particular got the dubious honor of portraying that morally suspect king who bound in matrimony the girl who could, apparently, spin straw into gold after threatening to kill her three times. A note on the lack of battle details: does anyone actually think that a team up of Sephiroth AND Zack AND Cloud _wouldn't_ be able to take down Shinra? As of now, "Small Favors" has more hits, but this has more reviews and in fact has the most reviews per viewers of anything I've written. That's a winner in my book! Thanks for reading and, hopefully, enjoying!


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